Fallout of the Past
by karrenia
Summary: Angela Petrelli muses on choices made, both past and present, and how the two seem to have come to a head of late. One Shot


Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to Tim Kring and NBC Television; it is not mine. 

Featuring: Angela Petrelli: Gen

Prompt: How much does she really now? What is her connection to the Haitian, and what did she mean about protecting Claire?  
Rating: Gen

"Fallout of the Past" by Karen

Angela Petrelli does not often dwell on events of the past, especially whether a decision had been the right one or the wrong one. However, recent events have forced her to reexamine a few of her own decisions and how they will affect her own family's secrets just now coming to light.

It's an uncomfortable situation taken all together, however as she has told her eldest son, there is still time for them to turn it around and with a lot of work shift things back in their favor.

Angela Petrelli waited in the dimly lit hospital room in Odessa, Texas at the bedside of her comatose youngest son, Peter.

Angela held his hand, queezing it and willing with every fiber of her being that he would wake up, or at least with a flicker of his dark eyelashes acknowledge that he was aware of her presence.

She did not have to understand why Peter had been so insistent on coming here, but if she understood one particular thing about her sons' very different personalities it is this; they are hard-headed stubborn men.

"At least they have that in common," she muttered aloud as she dropped Peter's hand long enough to reach over to the bedside table, pick up the water pitcher, pour a paper cup full. She then held Peter's mouth long enough to ge him to reflexively swallow some of the liquid.

As she did so her thoughts drifted back to a time during her junior year in college, shortly after a spring break vacation spent in the Carribean, and a young Haitian man she had seen so much untapped potential in that young man.

She had already had quite a few connections in various circles of influence, and brought from his village in Haiti to her college in New York where he thrived. Shortly after graduation she had lost track of the young man, but she had heard good reports of him, and felt confident that he was doing well.

Almost a decade later she received an unmarked postage paid envelope in the mail, the contents of which included a photo of both the Haitian, and a young blond girl, dressed in a cheerleader's outfit,minus the trademark pompoms. Among the other letters are documents and a few photo-copied pages from a book on genetics. Angela sighed, and realized that sometimes events from the past have a way of coming back in ways the one will least expect.

She of course, went and double-checked all of the facts, the dates, and came to one unavoidable and disconcerting conclusion; she was going to be a grandmother all over again, this young woman in the photos was Nathan Petrelli's illegitimate and biological daughter with a woman named Meredith that he had met prior to his marriage to Heidi.

She had gone to considerable effort to keep it a secret as long as she possibly could, from Nathan, from her husband, from the general public, not because she was afraid, but because she knew the potential danger of information falling into the wrong hands.

Nathan, by that time had already entered the public spotlight first as a trial lawyer and then became his stellar rise in the world of politics.

Now, with Peter in a coma, and Nathan running for congress it was more imperative than ever that the situation be handled carefully and with discretion. She knew she had tell Nathan about this Claire Bennett and she had to make a few calls to the Haitian, wherever he was, the only thing that was not as easily solved was what to do about the girl.

Off and on she toyed with the idea of telling Nathan to do the responsible thing; such as make contact with the girl's mother, explain why he could not acknowledge the girl, and then give her the requisite alimony money.

It was not the most efficient solution, not very compassionate perhaps, but under the circumstances they could not spare much in the way of compassion or tender feelings.

Angela brushed a wisp of gray-black hair away from her eyes, telling herself that would not cry even there was no one but her comatose son to witness the hair-line crack in her tightly controlled composure.

She stood up and began pacing around the small room. And then the tears came anyway, and she angrily hurled the now empty paper cup against the far wall as hard as she could. "Damn it!" she muttered aloud and then sat back down in her chair. "Peter, wake up, just wake up!"


End file.
